


Kar'tayl (Awareness)

by Clio_Codex



Series: Butterflies & Hurricanes [1]
Category: Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:14:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,658
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27568096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Clio_Codex/pseuds/Clio_Codex
Summary: Bo-Katan Kryze thought Death Watch was the answer to restoring Mandalore to the honor of its warrior past.  But what happens when she realizes the dream was false, and that her estranged sister, Satine, is in danger?Set during "The Lawless" (Clone Wars, season 5, episode 16).
Relationships: Bo-Katan Kryze & Satine Kryze, Obi-Wan Kenobi/Satine Kryze
Series: Butterflies & Hurricanes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1952704
Comments: 19
Kudos: 23





	Kar'tayl (Awareness)

**Author's Note:**

> If you are a fan of Clone Wars and Rebels you already know Bo (and like me are probably squeeing having seen her now on the Mandalorian!). If you are just meeting her for the first time, welcome!
> 
> This covers events in "The Lawless" - what motivated Bo's choices. It fits within canon except for one rather large detail (sorry, not sorry about that!). I've borrowed a few lines of dialogue from the episode and extended the scene on the landing platform to allow Bo and Satine time to talk.

When had she known? Was it Carlac, where they’d enslaved the women and burned the village?Or when they’d found Maul and his brother, half dead and adrift?Or was it when they’d allied with criminals, thieves with no honor? 

Even if she’d known, Bo-Katan Kryze had done nothing but play along, wanting to believe that Death Watch was the answer to restoring the true way of Mandalore, that they’d again be warriors with honor.There’d even been a moment when she’d have willingly killed her own sister, Satine, the Duchess, for her beliefs about peace and pacifism.Satine was wrong, but she was her blood.Bo should have known then, the error of this path.

Maybe she’d always known and just didn’t want to admit it, known that Death Watch’s Mandalore was not the Mandalore of her dreams any more than the Mandalore under the rule of Satine was.

But she’d followed Pre Vizsla and his Darksaber without question, had risen quickly in his ranks to be his right hand, both because she was a damn good fighter and strategist despite her relative youth and because of her name - to have a Kryze on their side, the sister of the Duchess herself, well that was a coup that Vizsla was quick to exploit.

He’d offered her more than that, too, when they were on Carlac - _Just think Bo, if our houses were joined, what that would mean for Mandalore._ He’d kissed her then, harsh and cold, but hungry, had pawed at her armor possessively, pushed her onto his bed and straddled her hips.She’d kicked him off, feigning playfulness, told him she wasn’t ready and needed to think. _Don’t think too hard_ , he said, running a gloved hand down her chest before he’d let her go. 

For a moment she’d thought about leaving; Vizsla wasn’t the man she wanted; the one she’d always wanted she’d left hurt and angry when she’d left for Death Watch. As she tried to think, she saw only his blue eyes, the ones that knew her soul, remembered the touch of the hands that went with those eyes. _Fuck all._ And yet she’d stayed, delaying giving Vizsla an answer by letting him steal kisses and touches and pretending she liked it. 

He never actually asked what she wanted, what she thought. 

Vizsla had been smart for a while at least.Many wanted a return to the past, to the true ways of Mandalore, so it wasn’t hard to find recruits.And he had had known just what to say to get them to follow.In the end though, he’d been too blinded by his lust for power and had foolishly thrown in with the Sith who claimed he wasn’t Sith anymore.Vizsla wasn’t the first Mandalorian to fall for that trap.

When Maul challenged him, he’d accepted and fought well, a bit of honor at the end at least - _Only the strongest shall rule_ , he’d said before dying.What had she felt when his head had rolled, when Maul had claimed the Darksaber?Grief?Fear?Defiance? 

She’d known then. _Never.No outsider will rule Mandalore_. 

Maul couldn’t lead them because he didn’t care about Mandalore beyond it being a path to his own ambitions.And in following Death Watch, she’d been little better.Defying Maul, that had been the first step on the path back to finding herself again, and maybe a path back to what Mandalorians could be once more. 

She’d gotten away with the best of her Nite Owls, flown into the night, explosions in their wake.

And now?Her redemption would begin with the rescue of her sister.Her nephew, her dead brother’s son, had come to her, all idealism and hope, convinced that he and his friends had a plan to save Satine.Not a bad plan for kids only half taught to fight.A few tweaks and they were into the prison where Satine was being held.

It had been years, but felt longer, like they were strangers instead of sisters.For some reason when she saw her, all Bo could think of was how Satine had braided her hair when she was small, her older sister who’d she’d thought hung the moon, the one who told her stories and tucked her in at night when their parents had been too busy with politics.

“Why are you helping me?”A fair question of course.Just last week, Bo had been trying to kill her.

The equation had changed, she told her.“The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

Satine sighed, “There was a time when we weren’t enemies.Perhaps that time has come again.”Bo hoped that it had.

Despite their differences, Bo couldn’t help but admire the sureness of her sister.Perhaps it did take a strange sort of courage to try to convince a people with warrior blood to follow a pacifist path.There was something to respect in that even if you couldn’t agree with it.It was clear, too, why people trusted her leadership.She wore no blasters, no armor, and yet Satine walked out of the prison unafraid, ready for what was next.

The kids were brave, too, but brave only gets you so far without a blaster and a jetpack. 

With the help of the Nite Owls, they made it to a landing platform on the edge of Sundari, their speeder wrecked.Satine got out a transmission, “Obi Wan, I need your help.”They’d lost the traitors for now, but that wouldn’t last. 

Satine grabbed her arm. “Bo, I need you to listen.We don’t have much time.”

She wanted to say she was sorry, that she’d figured out she’d done wrong and wanted to set things right.But Satine kept talking, a desperate sort of look in her eye.“I need you to promise me something, as my sister, my blood.”

“Promise you?Why me?Satine, I’m not sure…”

Satine cut her off, “You are my sister, Bo, no matter what has happened between us, no matter our differences.”Bo remembered Satine’s hands in her hair.“Please, I need you to listen.”

“I’m listening.”Listening was easy, right?

“I had a child.A daughter.”

 _Oh._ “What?When?”She wanted to add _with who_ to that list, but waited.

“About 8 months ago.She’s on Kalevala, safe….I hope.Our relatives have been able to care for her until now.And,” she looked carefully at Bo, “I asked Fenn Rau to guard her a few months ago.Just in case of something like this.”Of course she asked Rau.It was a good choice.Satine would know Rau’s loyalties and given that he was not allied with the New Mandalorians, well….Satine was always very clever.But if Bo promised her this, she have to face the consequences of her own poor decisions.Suddenly, she wanted to spit to rid her mouth of the memory of the wrong man’s kiss.

Easier to focus on Satine’s problems.“How the hell did you pull that off, hiding it I mean?”It was no doubt those ridiculous damn dresses Satine wore.You could hide lots of things in those skirts.

Satine just shook her head, “I’m the ruler of Mandalore.People generally don’t ask questions.”

There was more to this story though, the _who_.“Why is this a secret, Satine?Who’s the father?”

“That’s not important.I need you to promise me, Bo…”

“No,” Bo crossed her arms, eyeing her sister.“You can’t ask this of me and not tell me everything.”

“She’s your blood, Bo.I’m your blood.That must still mean something to you.”Satine was angry now, her words shrill and harsh. 

“Well, her father is too, is he not?So where is he in all this?” 

“He can’t know.”Satine’s eyes were wide with fear.Why the hell would she hide the child from her father like this?Bo couldn’t imagine that her sister would have engaged in a careless liaison; she just wasn’t the type to sleep with someone on a whim.

“Why?There’s a reason you aren’t telling me.”

“You need to go now Bo. Those loyal to Maul will be here any minute now.”

“Then we’ll both go and you’ll explain on the way.”

Satine looked at her sadly, her jaw set.“Alone you’ll make it.With me in tow there’s little chance.I need you to promise me you’ll keep her safe, keep Seren safe.”

 _Gods,_ she was asking her impossible things.To leave her here to no doubt die.To care for her child.To keep the child a secret.Better to focus on the practical.“How do you know I’ll make it?”

“I think you are rather good at evading capture, Bo-Katan,” Satine smiled just a bit.“I have been trying to catch you myself for quite a while with no success.”Well, she was right, on both counts.Satine wasn’t equipped to get out of the city much less off world.And Bo was good.“Besides, if I stay here, let them capture me, that will buy you time to get to Kalevala.If I escape, that’s the first place they’ll look and Seren won’t be safe.”

Oh, brave foolish Satine.But she was right about this, too.“You’re sure?” Bo found her voice sounded suddenly uncertain.

“Obi-Wan will come for Maul.And it isn’t in Maul’s interest to kill me, he might perhaps make things rather…unpleasant for me I suppose, but alive …he must know he can use me alive.”Bo wondered if Satine really believed that - that Maul’s actions would be driven either by logic or honor - or if she was just trying to justify the choice.“Obi will come.”

Something in Satine’s voice then triggered a memory from years before, when the Jedi had whisked Satine away until the New Mandalorians could make a plan for her safe return.Bo remembered the short holo calls, the way Satine had sounded when she talked about the younger of the two men - Obi-Wan Kenobi.

“Satine, did you…did you fuck the damn Jedi?”She’d not meant to be crude, but that her infernally proper older sister would do such an amazingly improper thing left her lost for niceties. 

Satine’s eyes betrayed her even as her face stayed calm, “I love him, Bo-Katan.If it matters.”

“Then why not tell him that….”

“No.”Satine grabbed her hand.“Swear to me, Bo.Swear on anything you value, swear on your life, that you won’t tell him.”

“Why?The man has a right to know he has a child.”

“They’ll take her, the Jedi.And it will ruin him.Swear it.”Bo wasn’t sure she understood, but maybe it didn’t matter.The look on Satine’s face told her to believe her, to trust her, to make the promise.

“Why are you trusting me with this?”

“You are my sister, Bo-Katan, I love you, and I trust you, to do what’s right.If I don’t…” Satine swallowed hard, “…just promise me to love her, to raise her strong.”

 _Fucking hell._ Satine was talking like a woman who knew she was going to die, who was planning to face that death with bravery and dignity.And she wanted Bo-Katan to promise to care for her child.This was not the rescue she’d planned. 

She found herself fighting a sudden tightness in her throat.“Fine.I swear.I promise.I’ll protect the girl.”What else could she say?

“Love her Bo.Raise her strong.”Satine repeated her earlier words, determined eyes staring at her hard.

Why her sister would ask this of her, would trust her to do it, she wasn’t sure.It was as though Satine understood how to forgive Bo before Bo knew how to forgive herself.Years later she’d wonder, too, if Satine saw the possible future of things, the path that Bo would take, if someone she’d known the implications of what she was asking.But in this moment, in this moment all Bo knew was that Satine did forgive her, did love her, did trust her - and maybe that meant she should trust herself.

“I promise, Satine.I swear on my life I’ll love her, keep her safe.”

Neither of them would cry.Maybe they were too proud, or too much a Kryze.Or maybe there just wasn’t time.Instead they embraced, a hard hug of sisters who wouldn’t say it, but knew this was probably good-bye forever.The sound of blaster fire grew closer; their allies were fighting off Maul’s forces but it wouldn’t hold.

“You need to go, Bo.”And that was the end of it, the last word between them.Bo nodded and then leapt off the platform, flying off to what she hoped was safety, hearing the noise of her sister’s capture as she did.

Bo waited days before trying to leave the city.They’d be watching the routes out and she needed to know what was happening in the capital to make any sort of plan about her own next moves.Maul was using Almec now as his puppet, trying to paint Satine as a traitor.In some ways, that wouldn’t be a hard sell even though most here in Sundari had bought into the New Mandalorian ways. 

Despite her contacts in the palace, it was hard to know exactly what was happening.Almec gave pretty speeches, Maul hanging in the shadows. She scoffed watching the crowds, terrified at the prospect of war on their doorstep, grown soft from years of forgetting who they were. 

Satine’s Jedi had come, alone it seemed, perhaps not the rescue that Satine had imagined.So the Republic wasn’t interested in Mandalore’s troubles - funny how they’d been so eager to intervene years earlier.They must know that Death Watch had broken with the Separatists then. 

That Kenobi had come anyway, suggested his interest was in her sister more than Mandalore.Brave bastard though, walking into what had to be a trap.Bo’s heart sank when she saw him being moved to the prison complex with no Satine in sight.But her people were ready to break him loose, and Kenobi held his own as they made their run for the starport.

Sundari was in chaos, the sky thick with smoke and blaster fire.“Maul must really want you dead, Kenobi.”He just looked at her sadly between deflecting blaster bolts.She didn’t want to know what that meant.

They made it to a ship, miraculously still flight worthy and not impounded.“Go back to your Republic and tell them what has happened.”Bo had no love for the Republic, of course, but their intervention could rid Mandalore of Maul and the remnants of Death Watch that followed him, could leave an opening for the right leader to step forward.

Kenobi balked, pointed to treaties and precedent, noted the Republic would invade.

“But Maul will die.And Mandalore will survive.We always survive.”As she said it, she knew it to be true.They would survive, rise again from the ashes, better and stronger than before.This was the ebb and flow of their history, to be battered and beaten and divided, sometimes by their own doing, only to find themselves again, united and strong, warriors of honor once again. 

He was halfway up the ramp before he turned back, “You’re Satine’s sister, aren’t you?I’m so sorry.”She didn’t turn around, didn’t ask, didn’t respond.Satine was dead then.For a split second she considered telling him about the child, but Satine had made her promise, and she would keep her word.

Bo would find her own way off world, head back to Kalevala as the battle died off.Now she knew, was sure of her path.She’d protect the girl, raise her strong, and learn to love her.And maybe, in doing that, she could mend things she’d broken, and find her role in bringing Mandalore out of the ashes.

**Author's Note:**

> The story continues with Yaim'ol (next in the series) as Bo heads back to Kalevala. I actually wrote that first so it is all finished :)
> 
> Always happy to hear what folks think!


End file.
